When Working, Be Diligent
“Let’s get to work~!”
With the supervisor’s call, people finally started filing onto the line in pairs. Seong-min, of course, was fully geared up in his cotton work gloves as well.
“Whoa, these cotton gloves feel amazing!”
Min-hyeok flexed his fists open and closed, letting out an admiring whistle as he joined Seong-min on the line.
“If you’re going to do this kind of work, you should at least bring a pair of gloves. What are you doing showing up with nothing but a phone and a wallet?”
“Parcel loading’s just moving boxes and stuff, right? I figured two good legs and two hands were all I needed.”
“Well… you’re not exactly wrong about that.”
Two good hands and two good legs really were enough for the job.
“Hyung…”
“What?”
“You’re not still mad at me, right?”
“I’m not mad.”
“I knew it~! Just from your face, I could tell you weren’t the type to be petty about something like that.”
“You actually know how to read faces?”
“Don’t I look like someone who can read faces?”
“Not really.”
With his flashy clothes and bleached blond hair, Min-hyeok looked about as far from a physiognomy expert as a person could get.
“Then what do I look like to you, hyung?”
“Like a guy who parties.”
“Oh~ damn! That’s sick!”
“Did you party a lot in school?”
“I partied a little… Hyung, you can read faces too? You nailed it just from looking at me. You’re no ordinary guy.”
“……”
“Did you study that kind of stuff?”
“No.”
Seong-min turned away as he answered.
“Whoa, but you figured it out just from my face?”
Seong-min was starting to wonder if this kid was messing with him.
“Are you being serious right now?”
“I’m asking seriously.”
“……”
“I’ve flipped through a few books on face-reading before. Studied it a little. Did you learn from books too?”
“No.”
“So you got it right without studying face-reading at all?”
“I just guessed.”
“Holy crap! Hyung, you should study physiognomy for real~! You’ve got talent!”
For a second, Seong-min thought, Is this guy an idiot?
One look at Min-hyeok’s clothes and the vibe he gave off was enough to scream “party kid.” Anyone—not just Seong-min—would take one glance and figure the guy had spent some time running wild.
Just then, a truck began backing into the bay.
“Get ready. Looks like we’re starting.”
“Oh~ so this is finally the legendary parcel loading and unloading? My heart’s pounding!”
Watching Min-hyeok rub his gloved hands together with pure anticipation, Seong-min let out a short snort of laughter.
“Legendary? What are you talking about?”
“Everyone says parcel loading is brutal. Like, full-on legendary-tier hard.”
“Yeah, parcel loading really is brutal. Brace yourself.”
“Oh~ so you’re a veteran, hyung?”
“I’ve done it a few times.”
“Come to think of it, you seemed to know the supervisor earlier too.”
“You do it enough times, you get to know faces.”
“Oh~ connections! So hyung’s got some serious connections around here~!”
“Enough weird talk. Let’s just start.”
At last the truck’s rear doors swung open to either side like the entrance to a dungeon.
“Whew~ it’s packed solid.”
Min-hyeok whistled at the cargo crammed inside.
“We’re in trouble.”
“Huh?”
“This looks like a produce truck—kimchi, radishes, that kind of stuff. Brace yourself.”
“Is it that heavy?”
“You’ll find out once you try.”
Among the things nobody wanted to move during parcel loading, kimchi boxes, crates stuffed full of produce, sacks of rice, and exercise equipment like dumbbells ranked right at the top. Looking at what had just rolled in, this was clearly a produce truck. The labels for napa cabbage and radish kimchi were everywhere—so the very first truck of the day already promised a long, hard road.
“Alright. Let’s go.”
Steeling himself, Seong-min grabbed the first box of cabbage kimchi and started hauling.
“Don’t let the looks fool you—I’ve got stamina!”
Min-hyeok psyched himself up and followed, hoisting a kimchi box with both hands.
“Urgh…!”
The weight hit him like a brick. It was no joke.
“Heavy, right?”
Seong-min asked as he came back after dropping off his first box. Min-hyeok just grinned.
“This much… is nothing!”
He shuffled over, set the box on the conveyor rail, watched it glide away, then headed back toward the truck.
“Let’s knock this out fast and take a break~!”
With that bold declaration, Min-hyeok began hauling the boxes one after another.
Time slipped by.
“This… is the last one.”
Wiping the sweat running down his forehead, Seong-min carried out the final kimchi box and handed it off to Min-hyeok waiting below.
“This is the last one.”
“For real? There’s nothing left…?!”
“Nothing.”
“Hnnngh…”
Min-hyeok staggered over to the rail, set the box down, then straightened up and pounded his lower back with both fists.
“This is fucking hard….”
“Tired?”
Seong-min had already climbed down from the truck and walked over to where Min-hyeok was still working his back.
“Man… at first I thought if we just moved fast we’d be done in no time, but this is seriously brutal!”
“You were the one who called parcel loading legendary.”
“This isn’t legendary—this is legend!”
Seong-min found a spot to sit, opened his bag, and pulled out a water bottle. He took a couple of long swallows.
“Want some?”
“Hell yeah!”
Min-hyeok practically lunged for the bottle and gulped the water down.
“Whoa… water actually helps a little.”
“Don’t start looking like you’re about to die already.”
“Huh?”
“The second truck’s coming soon, so rest while you can—even if it’s just for a minute.”
“A second truck’s coming in?!”
“What, you thought this was the only one?”
“Holy… shit… I’m losing my mind.”
Right then Seong-min spotted another truck slowly backing into the line.
“There it is.”
“No way, it’s already here?!”
Seeing the look on Min-hyeok’s face like he’d just bitten into something foul, Seong-min added one more line.
“Don’t run. If you do, I’m the only one who suffers more.”
Fortunately—or maybe not—Min-hyeok didn’t run.
Plenty of people worked the morning, then vanished after a bathroom break, or bailed during lunch. Min-hyeok stuck it out all the way to 5:30 in the afternoon.
Most days they worked until five, with the last half hour for cleanup. So in practice, the real work ended at five.
When the shift was over they gathered in front of the supervisor, who thanked them for their hard work, checked off names one by one, and handed out envelopes of daily wages.
Some places transferred the money straight to accounts, but getting a physical envelope of cash made the day’s labor feel more real, more rewarding. A fair number of sites still kept the tradition of paying day wages in cash envelopes for that reason—especially for people whose credit was too poor to use bank accounts. All of that was why they handed out cash.
“Been a while, so it must’ve been pretty rough, huh?”
The supervisor smiled as he spoke to Seong-min.
“Yeah, after taking it easy for a bit, my body’s feeling it.”
“Still, you’ve got grit. I like that about you. Take your envelope.”
“Thank you.”
Inside was 170,000 won for the day’s work.
It was less than the demolition jobs, sure, but demolition work didn’t come around every day. Parcel loading, on the other hand, was steady work as long as you could handle it—so it was fine.
Next, Min-hyeok stepped up to the supervisor.
“Looking like a slippery little punk, I figured you’d bolt, but you toughed it out.”
“Would’ve been a waste to quit halfway.”
“Good. Just not running and finishing the job is already solid work. Here.”
Min-hyeok took the envelope with a grin.
With a final round of “good work today, go rest up,” the day shift was officially over.
Seong-min walked over to the vending machine and punched in a coffee. Min-hyeok came up beside him.
“Hyung.”
“Want one?”
“Coffee?”
“Yeah.”
“If you buy it, I’ll drink it~!”
Seong-min was about to hit the milk-coffee button again when—
“Wait!”
“Huh?”
He looked over, wondering what the problem was, and Min-hyeok pressed the cocoa button instead.
“If there’s cocoa, I always go cocoa~!”
“You like chocolate?”
“I’m not that big on sweet stuff in general. But cocoa’s good.”
Seong-min nodded and pocketed the leftover change.
“Hyung, let’s go over there.”
He turned and saw the smoking area.
“Having a smoke with your coffee is just the natural order of things, right?”
“I don’t smoke.”
“Then this is the perfect chance to start again.”
“No thanks.”
“I don’t get it~ turning down something this good.”
Min-hyeok sat on the bench, reached into his pocket for a pack—and his face twisted like he’d bitten into something rotten.
“Ah… damn. Right. No cigarettes. Fuck.”
He’d already remembered that he’d been bumming smokes all morning and at lunch because he was out.
“Hyung, one sec.”
He suddenly stood up.
“Going to buy some?”
“Gotta bum one.”
“……”
Min-hyeok walked over to a middle-aged guy who was smoking, chatted him up cheerfully, scored a single cigarette, said thanks, and came back.
“See that? If you’re out, just ask other smokers. Korean smokers still have hearts, you know.”
He stuck it between his lips and lit it with a lighter.
“Hooo… fucking delicious~”
Only then did Min-hyeok look satisfied. Seong-min gave a dry little laugh and went back to his coffee.
With my Stamina stat at 30, the parcel loading work is definitely more doable than last time.
His raw strength still ran short, but the muscular endurance and physical stamina that came with a Stamina stat of 30 made the job manageable in its own way.
What Seong-min was really looking forward to was the fact that parcel loading ranked among the truly brutal jobs. Brutal meant labor hard enough to leave the body exhausted. And that meant experience points.
“Heh heh heh…”
He hadn’t even opened the Status Window yet, but he was already excited imagining how much EXP he’d racked up.
“Oh~”
Beside him, Min-hyeok suddenly let out a sound of pure admiration. Seong-min looked over, puzzled.
“Why the sudden reaction?”
“Hyung, you were thinking dirty thoughts just now, weren’t you?”
“Huh?”
“That laugh just now was seriously shady~ You were thinking about girls while drinking your coffee, right? I know that look. I nailed it, didn’t I?!”
“……”
This kid was definitely not normal.